Sea Kayaking Student Paddle - Blake Island

Trip Report

SIGHTED: SEAL, DOLPHIN, EAGLE, CORMORANT, LOON, MERGANSER, GREAT BLUE HERON SAT 09/06/25 – SOUTHWORTH TO AND CIRCUMNAVIGATE BLAKE ISLAND, 5 NM 

By the time Sat morning rolled around Laura was the only one still on the roster. I got to the launch site adjacent to the Southworth ferry dock a short time before 1000.  Laura showed up a few minutes later. We unloaded at the top of the beach and then moved our cars to the lot at the top of the parking lot for the ferry.  The old slot system is gone and you can’t use a credit card.  There is a sign posted with the app to read to pay the $11 per night and it will extend if needed. My phone was in my bags down on the beach.  Laura Kindly offered to pay for me but I told her I would just pay when we got back tomorrow. We were back at the boats by 1030.  The sandy strip is only about 20’ wide at the very top and the rest was a long and careful haul of our gear and boats down the slippery rocky beach. There had been a few drops on my windshield and the rain pattered down lightly as we worked the short time to get ready. The tide was way out but mercifully was pretty much done ebbing by the time we had the boats loaded.  We paused for a moment as I noticed what must have been my first face to face encounter with an actual sea slug sans shell down by the water line. It was a very pale grey at least as large as my fist with what looked like a little horn sticking out one end and was barely moving from side to side.  Sea slugs are often toxic and should never be touched. No problem there for either one of us and I moved my boat well away from it.  When I went back with my camera I couldn’t find it so that was probably just as well.  Laura and I had our discussion about tides, currents, weather, etc. We decided to do the paddle to the island first, empty the boats, claim a campsite, have lunch and then do the circ of the island for another three miles. Do the rescues that she was required to do for her graduation tomorrow before we load up the boats to come back.

 We took off about 1115 under gray skies that gradually cleared to partly sunny as we wound along the western shore to the tanker loading dock (it was empty) at the north end by the mouth of Rich Passage.

Laura is a quick study and used my chart (hers was too limited) to figure out where we were and correctly named the land masses around us and the direction of the now flooding current. I showed Laura the “Rule of Thumb” to set a slight ferry angle to get over to the sand spit on the north west end of Blake Island and by the time we got there right on target about 1230 the sun had come out. 

Unfortunately so was the tide….wwwaaayyy out still so we decided for now to just carry our lunches to the happily empty WWTA campsite on the north side of the spit.  There was nothing on the flat and muddy boat to anchor them with so we pulled our boats up a ways where we could still watch them as we settled at the picnic table at site #51.  She left to find the bathroom and I paid for our campsite at the kiosk, $12 a night, cash or check only.  By the time she came back we had to run for the boats as mine as usual was trying to take off in the rising tide. It was 1240 by the time we started our circumnavigation of the island. By the time we got back around an hour later the tide had risen considerably. 

It was a short, if slippery at times, carry up the seaweed covered beach.  The stuff is like wet spinach at the top of the high tide line and piles up into big soggy mounds. We pulled our now empty boats over them and rested them on the driftwood logs well above the high tide mark so there will be no need to tie them off tonight.

There is a nice couple from West Seattle who had arrived in a double when we got back from our paddle and are at the campsite #50. I was pleasantly hailed re: my IKEA bags as we were unpacking. We then set up our tents and attempted to get my Kelty tarp up but with no trees we couldn’t come up with anything satisfactory.  It wasn’t raining, the wind wasn’t doing much so we decided to just stuff it back in its sack and take our chances.

 We snacked and chatted at the table.  It had been fairly muggy but things began cooling off and it was about 5:30 when I ate my sandwich dinner. Then up to the bathroom with the flushing toilet and running sink (no lighting) to clean up.  The potable water was also turned on by the camping kiosk on the west side on the right side of the trail up to the bathroom.  I came the long way back noticing the orange sunset through the trees.  I went to camp; Laura had come back from her walk on the beach.  I grabbed my camera and showed her the trail on the western side that led up to the bathroom; the other route is much longer. Then I walked on the beach around the spit and back to our campsite. There were a surprising number of tents set up on the west side.  No hurry to get up tomorrow.  High tide is not until after 4 PM so there will plenty of time to sleep in, walk around the island and do our rescues with empty boats before loading up to go home. 

SUN 09/07/25 – BLAKE ISLAND TO SOUTHWORTH, 2 NM  Laura had said before we got into our tents that she hoped it would rain and thunder.  It did both—one flash of lightning, one bolt of thunder just as I was turning out the light.  Rain would patter on and off but the rain had stopped and the tent was hardly wet when I got up around 9:00 or so. 

 Photo: Laura Lorenz

Laura was gone as I ate my breakfast at the table.  The table was only slightly wet; she came up from the beach as I was finishing. We sat and talked a while.  She agreed to come on a walk and we took off sometime around 10:00 I guess in the milky sunshine with no rain.  We got to the sadly shut down Tillicum Village building and sat on the porch a bit.  Then we walked up to the ranger station where I saw that they were supposed to be open until 11:00. It was about 5 minutes before but the window was shut with the blind down but a young ranger appeared around from the side.  He very obligingly opened everything up and I got my It’s It ice cream treat for the year.

We had a young male deer with fuzzy antlers of 1 prong feeding close by; he paid almost no attention to us and I got some nice shots with my camera. Now that I think about it, I don’t think I have ever seen any deer with more than 2 prongs at most.

 I asked the ranger about the lack of raccoons and he thinks they either starved or swam off the island.  They have been getting skinnier every year since Tillicum Village shut down during the pandemic. We then went up to the old house foundation; it doesn’t look like a very big place but foundations usually don’t.  There was a tree growing close by with large round dark fruit hanging in bunches on them.  I tried one; it had a pit and tasted faintly sweet.  I spit it out and washed out my mouth with my tea just in case. 

We then started off on the Red Trail.  I thought it would be doing the circumference of the island but we weren’t getting much of a sea view.  Laura checked her phone; we were more on an overland trail but it was too late to go back so we continued on through the forest.  Some beautiful trees, some pretty good sized hemlocks and several madronas. 

I sat down a couple of times when benches presented themselves; it was getting hot towards the end and some of the path was uphill.  We did get some good views right above the beach once it intersected with another trail along the southwest side and we also paused at the old campsite on the SW side.  We must have put our tents right above the embankment because I couldn’t see where we could have put them anywhere else along the trail.  But that was a lllooonnggg time ago. And I never stayed there again for good reason; that embankment was a pain to get a boat up on.  We bumped into Tim and his friend…I didn’t get her name….on the south side about halfway around the island.  He showed us a really nice picture he had taken the night before of the Seattle skyline all lit up and Laura’s tent glowing in the dark.    He said it was fine for me to use it in my report. Tim sent it by him and Laura holding their phone towards each other at the same level; I don’t know what they used to actually send it but I felt like I had just witnessed phone porn or something. But Laura is going to send me the picture! 

It was around 12:30 or so I guess when we got back to camp.  Laura set up her stove to make her lunch and I wound up eating mine eventually and we had more conversations before taking our time and pulling up our camp. The tide had come up quite a ways by around 3:00 when we put on our drysuits—we have the same color!—and I blew up my float bag to do the rescues.  She didn’t need for me to demonstrate and instead we verbally went over the steps which she executed perfectly on her first try.  I did a little more instructing than I normally do since she didn’t have a demonstration.  Then we did the mutual assisted and I had a hard time getting her boat up on my front deck.  It seemed heavy and very reluctant to get hauled up but I finally got it emptied out and back in position.  A couple of boat wakes came in just as she was getting back in but she had no issues and was soon sitting in place and pumping away.  A lot; I thought I had gotten out more than that.  Then it was my turn to jump in; I didn’t bother to wet exit, just jumped in.  She got me in pretty quickly and that was that.  Then it was return to the shore where I began packing up my boat.  She sat by hers and waited; it turned out that she had already packed it which explained my difficulty with it. Good thing mine wasn’t packed; I don’t think a flooded and loaded Mariner would hardly be possible for anybody to empty out. 

The wind had switched to the south during the night but was still barely felt as we cleared the island and began heading south.  Laura chose to do a direct route back to the ferry dock and identified it.  We had a slight current with us so it didn’t take very long to reach our take out almost bang on at high tide just after 1600, pausing to watch some dolphins along the way and we could hear their little “poofs” of air.

A cormorant was standing on a buoy with its wings outspread; usually you see them doing this up on much higher structures.

Since we arrived pretty much at max high tide there was nothing but sand this time to deal with and a guy sitting on the logs when we first came up. 

We hauled our stuff out and pulled the boats up after rinsing them off to set on the logs before we went up and got the cars. Laura showed me how to use the app to pay my parking fee.  Her tall truck was a bit of a challenge to get the boat on and off but we didn’t have any problems. She had come on the Southworth ferry from Seattle but didn’t seem too fussed over which one she caught back.  It was about 5:00 when we had our post trip huddle with no complaints.  And now Olympia has another graduate!  I hope to paddle with her again soon.      

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